Conversation in a Gaol Cell
by squelchything
Summary: Rose is having some difficulty coping with her actions when she looked into the vortex. Oh, and Jack has just got the two of them thrown in gaol, but that's a minor problem. A followup fic to 'Chasing the TARDIS', but it's not vital to have read it first.


"I was only saying hello," Jack complained. "How was I meant to know it was illegal on this planet?" 

"Jack, the way you say hello ought to be illegal on any planet." 

"Shut up, I'm trying to think of a plan." 

Their cell was inconveniently free from the traditional rusty bars that could be filed through with cutlery, or loose floorboards that could be lifted and used to dig an escape tunnel in the earth beneath. Rose rolled her eyes. "This plan, would it by any chance involve seducing the gaolers?" 

Jack grinned. "Why change a winning formula?" 

"One problem. I don't see any guards." 

The grin developed into a smirk. "Wanna get in practice?" 

Rose snorted. "Only if they tell us we're going to be executed in the morning." 

"Did I ever tell you about the time—?" 

"Yes. Twice. Jack, you're a public menace." 

"I really liked the way you hit the police with that chair," Jack said in an obscure sort of apology. 

"Thanks. I think." 

"What are you doing?" 

"Phoning the TARDIS. He's not answering, though. Get back to your phone, Doctor, we could do with being bailed out here..." 

She let the phone ring on until a noise distracted her, and she looked up to see Jack lying on his stomach, trying to melt the door off its hinges with a gun. 

"I thought they took away all your weapons," she said. 

"Rose, you ought to know by now: I always have another gun." 

"Except when it's a banana. So why aren't we out of here yet?" 

"It's some sort of reinforced titanium mixture. I can only melt a bit at a time." 

"This is where a sonic screwdriver would be really useful, wouldn't it?" Rose asked innocently. 

"Next time I'll try to get arrested with the Doctor, then." 

"Well, shout if you want a rest and I'll do it for a bit." Rose leaned back on her elbows. 

"I never asked him what happened to you, you know," she said abruptly, after a pause. 

"Who? What? Oh, that." Jack stopped trying to melt his way through the door by millimetres. "Why not?" 

"I met a Dalek before. I know what they do." 

"Ah." 

"It caught emotions off me and then it went insane and exterminated itself." 

"Nice for you." 

"I s'pose. It was sort of sad. I felt sorry for it, at first. They'd been torturing it. I wouldn't bother, now." 

Jack sat up on one elbow. "I can't say I would, either." 

_EXTERMINATE, it had said, and he'd been _so_ afraid, he'd known for hours that he was going to die and this was it, one last cheap wisecrack, buying precious seconds for the Doctor...he knew there had to have been pain but he can't remember it._

"I'm the soppy one, remember?" Rose reached out and put her hand on the back of Jack's head. His haircut was starting to grow out, soft and spiky. 

"Rose, who was the guy who attacked windmills?" 

"Dunno. The Doctor might. Ask him." 

Jack shot at the door again, trying to think of the word for someone crazy enough to waste compassion on a Dalek. 

"I can't remember looking into the TARDIS," Rose said. She clasped her ankles, knees hugged to her chest. "I told you that and it isn't quite true. Imagine you were blind and deaf and couldn't taste or smell or feel. That's what it feels like to be me, now, when I try to remember properly. But I can't remember what I saw, even though I know I saw everything. I want to remember about you, and what happened to the Doctor, but I can't. It's mental, so frustrating." 

"What do you remember?" 

"Light. And—I loved the Doctor very much." 

Jack twisted round to look at her. "Well, you do." 

"Yes, but I love other people too. Then, it was all I felt—it was practically all I _was_." 

"If that was from the TARDIS, it does make sense. They've been together for a long time." 

"Mmm. But some one of us wanted you to be alive, cos here you are. I just wish I knew which one it was." 

"Does it matter?" Jack asked. The whole subject of his death and resuscitation made him more than a little uncomfortable. 

"I can't explain why but it does." 

"Maybe it was the TARDIS. Keep the Doctor happy by giving him humans to play with." 

Rose started to smile. 

"Or maybe she found my charm irresistible," Jack went on. Rose smacked his arm. 

"She?" 

"All ships are female. Fact of life." 

"I might have to get jealous. I'm meant to be the token girl." 

There was a loud bang from outside. 

"What's that?" Rose said. 

"Here's hoping it's the Doctor," Jack said, sitting up. A moment later there was the very welcome sound of the door being unlocked with a sonic screwdriver. Opening it was rather more difficult, because of the damage Jack had done to the hinges. 

"Can't take you two anywhere," the Doctor said flippantly as he levered at the door. "Left you for five minutes and you get gaoled, for crying out loud. What would you do without me to look after you?" 

"We were having a nice restful chat, actually," Jack retorted, kicking at the door until it was open person-wide. "Not in distress in any shape or form." 

"Oh, stop doing the competitive male thing and let's get out of here," Rose said, squeezing through the door behind Jack. "Which way is the TARDIS?"

* * *

"Best getaway vehicle in the entire universe," Rose said, some minutes later. Perhaps Jack's female-TARDIS theory was right. _Old married couple,_ she thought, _and when we go to the wrong place it's because _he_ wanted to go to the stockcars and _she_ wanted to go to a posh restaurant, but she really loves him anyway._

Rose patted the console room wall, and giggled. 

"What's the joke?" the Doctor asked. 

Rose shook her head. "No joke." 

Somehow she felt that Jack was right, that it didn't matter what had happened when she had looked into the vortex, because the TARDIS had been guiding her, a person who loved the Doctor even more than she did. She patted the wall again, and under her breath she said, "Thank you." 


End file.
